The Bowshot King (A Nomad Quest)

It was dawn, a beautiful, picturesque dawn. Golden light washing over the plains, a pure, cool dome of lapis lazuli the sky. The birds were singing their songs and the wind whispered in the reeds.

Atil was chopping heads. There were a hundred odd of them. The porters and servants, those that didn't join Hongchen Liyan on his brave stand all ran off a long ways. Fifteen odd cavalry couldn't capture all of them, so Atil's retinue contented themselves with the horses, the carts, and the armor. That was still quite a lot! They ran the numbers, and concluded that the total trade value should be enough to buy an entire herd of bison. An entire herd of the shaggy beasts.

As it turned out, the Serpi had broken down the butchery of man into a quick and businesslike process, the same as butchering goats. You drag out the corpse, put him face down, and take a nice, heavy cutting blade, such as a glaive or certain sorts of saber. Then wham, bam, head goes on the cart to bring back to the khan to brag about your prowess. The body gets put off to get stripped of armor, clothing, jewelry, preferably by the younger members of the warband, because all the youth need a healthy dose of miserable drudgery to build character. Thankfully for Atil, he was still a prince and therefore awarded more respect.

Jigei Tolma came up just as Atil finished the chop on a big, broad shouldered soldier. Atil kicked away the head to the small pyramid where they were all piled up. He was a little flushed. It was an uncommon exercise, and his back was beginning to sour. "Ho there, master. I believe I understand what it's like to grow old and have your back crack all the damn time." He punctuated this by arching his back and producing several alarming cracks.

"You haven't a single clue, but trust the young to speak for the old in all matters. Come with me if you're so tired, then."

They did so. They walked to a small hillock, a outcrop of rock that was only as tall as a man's chest. There, at the top of the promontory, they assumed their positions. Atil climbed on a precarious cliff, standing half on and half off. Jigei Tolma sat somewhat underneath him. "Well?" Atil asked.

His mentor studied his face. "You don't seem particularly sad."

"Indeed I don't. Should I?"

"Well, I had thought you would. You, after all, highly regard the Moth and Flower."

"One can admire a bear but refuse to live alone in the woods." Not even this strange interrogation could dampen Atil's mood. He was always looking to the far off horizon, westwards to home.

There was a pause as Jigei Tolma collected his thoughts, tapping out a rhythm onto the stone. "When we entered Eternal Peace, I had thought you lost. You fell in love with the city, fell in with that historian," he started. "And, you know, for a while I thought you were happy. You looked alive." Atil blushed. He didn't think he was that obvious. "And then, of course, you suddenly turned on them, like a snake in a breechcloth."

"Sorry, do you disapprove?"

"No, hardly!" Jigei Tolma laughed. "It was a rare and cunning stratagem. It reminds me when I rode with Timurbey, but that's another matter. I only remark on this because it's strange for a child that loves those plowmen so to turn around and suddenly slaughter them in this daring ambush."

"My dear sir," Atil smiled, "have you forgotten that for the past seven or so years you have been drilling the Anggarge into my young, impressionable mind? Why, my mind was all abuzz with visions of skull pyramids and suchlike. Besides, you can't say the Moth and Flower are all friends between the insect and the plant. Half of their history, the interesting half, is stuffed to bursting with fratricidal war. It is possibly the most depressing thing-- for all their talk of civilization and harmony, what they love most is that time where their empire was divided into thirds. A hundred years of war! A hundred years of heroes and generals, killing each other in job lots! So you see, sir, that I am only following the best examples of two nations: the hero of the Serpi, Anggar, and those bloody handed heroes of the Moth and Flower.

"Besides, they were morons for not seeing it sooner. That guy in the court, he had the right idea. If they listened to him and ignored me, then the Moth and Flower would be in a better place. The fact that the Thearch believed me-- can you believe that? We shouldn't reward idiots. Heaven knows, it only leads to bad ends, like the bottom of a shallow grave. We have to tend idiots," Atil grinned. "Like sheep. Raise them for a year, feed them the finest things. But when all's said and done, they're still ending up in the pot."

"Well, I don't know if that's true from the heart or false from the face," Jigei Tolma declared. "You're far too good of a singer and a liar to let it show, at least in part thanks to me. Was that little speech off the cuff?"

"I've been working on it on and off, since we left Eternal Peace," Atil said modestly. "It wasn't a spur of the moment thing. Anyway, let's get going. They're probably done with all the dead bodies anyway." He slid off the rock and waited for Jigei Tolma.

"One last thing," the old man said as he carefully picked his way down. "How are you holding up?"

"Old man, and I say this with the utmost respect, didn't I just soliquize my inner thoughts to the world?"

"I'm talking about the killing thing," he snapped. "Pull your head out of your own ass. What do you feel about actually killing a person? Not a sheep or a deer, a person. With thoughts, hopes, and aspirations to the future?"

Atil shrugged. He looked inside himself, he really did. But when all's said and done… "Master, I felt several thumps when I rode a horse over them, and this jolt when my lance connected. Other than that," he shrugged, "nothing at all. Rather, I'm far more looking forward to the bit where I can brag about this to the Xige Angha Khan."

---

The camp was fifty leagues west, the travel of a day and night. When Atil and his retinue found the first outriders, the heads were beginning to rot, becoming sort of mushy, like overripe apples. They were rotting into a single, sticky, and entirely disgusting mass. Yet, the sight of it was as good as a royal pass. The first outrider was about to order his men to lose arrows on Atil's caravan before he saw all the heads and said, "now, boys, ease up, for over there is a raiding party returning with their booty."

They were directed along the bend of a river, where horses in the thousands dipped their muzzles into the crisp waters. White tents blanketed the fields and mountains, shining like white stones. His harvest of strange fruit drew the entire camp's attention. A cart heaped with heads, a cart heaped with silver, and a cart heaped with iron. This was the seed of legends, as Atil had planned. All flocked to him, and Atil barely managed to keep his distant, regal air until he judged that the surrounding crowd was large enough for an audience. At the river banks he drew up his carts, and straightaway he leapt off his horse and onto the cart carrying the silver taels. Oh, the faces of home. He saw the faces of his fathers and uncles, mothers and aunts, all the soldiers and the hunters and all the herders and the weavers, staring up at him in expectant . "Serpi people!" he cried. "I am Atil, once of the Sudynn, the child of Mete Han! Ten long years I spent in the land of the plow. Now I have returned, and it is my intention to rejoin my native nation!

"To prove that I am no fraud, I arrive with three treasures! The blood of the enemy!" The flies buzzed and the heads stunk. "The wealth of the foe! And the arms of the Moths! All you Serpi people, I ask you. Will you have me?"

There was silence, and then a singular explosion of noise. "Young sir!" cried a man, battle scarred and no older than Atil, "join us! We're a group of heroes out for our glory! Our bey offers equal shares in the loot! Add your arrow to our quiver!"

"Ah shut it, clod!" snarled an older man, bearded and turbaned. "Hey, hero! You're the age of my daughter! Our family's livestock covers the plains! Add your blood to ours!"

"Atil! Atil of the Sudynn!" a wizened figure wailed. "What a shame for the descendant of sages to sully his hands with blood. We live in the fading age! Sages murder and steal, and children no longer heed the law of their ancestors!" This received no purchase, for no sooner did the words leave his mouth than he was set upon by several young raiders, indignant that this old stick would slander their livelihood.

"Don't listen to any of them!" hollered another. "All of them want you to join them. My brothers and I want to join you! Atil Bey! Doesn't that sound grand?"

The clamor and the din reached heaven, louder than thunderbolts. Atil simply stood their, arms wide, a stupid grin on his face. He felt thoroughly assaulted by the noise, as if love and adulation was a club and he was its unfortunate target. Stupifying, heady. All of that, and he knew, deep down, that he was the cause. He made them scream Atil, played their heartstrings until all the crowd could think about was how important, how paramount Atil was.

It was unfortunate indeed that it did not last long. A single word rang out over the crowd. It came in a whisper, because power doesn't need to shout. Power doesn't need speeches. All it needed was a single word.

"Quiet," whispered the Xige Angha Khan, seated on a blood red charger, surrounded by his day guard.

It came in stages. First, the people nearest the khan shut up. Then they nudged their neighbors, hushed them. The order rippled outwards, until the entire congregation was on their knees.

"Ah," Xige Angha Khan whispered, "Atil."

He was old, Atil considered. Graying. Smallpox scars crossed his face, and a goatish beard sprouted from his chin. His eyes were milky white, and yet, somehow, Atil got the impression that those smooth orbs were still dead fixed on him. The Khan trotted forwards.

"You've grown."

"Sir."

"Come down from there."

Atil did so. He knelt on the wet, dew-covered grass as Xige Angha Khan plunged a hand into a basket of silver, withdrew a tael, and bit down on it. "It's true silver," he announced to the crowd. "Atil. Explain."

"This is the gift that the August Thearch sent to you, thinking that you were so little of a man that you would be brought off by this measly present," Atil said quickly.

"It's quite a lot, though," the Khan evaluated, jingling a handful of silver. "And of course, Atil, you are so faithful to my rule that you hurried here to notify me of this bribe?" Xige Angha Khan snorted. "Yes, of course, my young brave. Are these heads?"

"Of the enemy!"

"I heard you the first time. You've got a set of lungs on you. And no doubt you spilled their blood with my name on your lips, proving your bravery and loyalty once and for all, eh?" Irony heaped like winter snow. The only way out, Atil judged, was sincerity.

"Of course, my Khan! Ten long years!" he roared. "Ten long years, I spent in wooden houses! There I dreamed of nothing more than the great grasslands, the anchor of the Heaven Mountain and the rushing waters of the Earthly River!"

"Hmm." The Khan stroked his beard. Damn, the man was impenetrable, Atil judged. "Don't you want to return to Lakh? See your mother, see your father."

"My khan, if you say I must, then I will. But if you say that we must ride, then I ride."
"Aaaah, Atil. You don't know how much I esteem those words." His old, gnarled hands, like the roots of an old tree, reached down and picked Atil up, drawing him into an embrace. "Atil," the Xige Angha Khan said, releasing him. "The Khan takes his tribute from the blood of his foes. Take that cart away. As for the rest… use it to hire your first warband. You've become a man now, Atil. You'll do a man's work on this raid."

As Xige Angha Khan leaves, what is Atil's impression of him?
[]- A tired old man. Look at him! He has to know that Atil must have hated him, and now because of a simple trick, he actually trusts Atil? Come on now! His sharp mind is rusting in his dotage.
[]- A dangerous rival. Look, he obviously thinks that Atil's up to something, and the fact is, Atil is. The canny old bugger needs to go, or Atil needs to play nice and wait him out. Preferably the Xige Angha Khan will do Atil the favor of dying before Atil makes his play for universal hegemony.
[]- Actually not bad! Obviously he's a bit wary, but look: Atil's got all of his war loot, and he's got the ability to form his own band with the Khan's direct blessing. That's pretty good, and a lot to thank the Xige Angha Khan for.